Grounded
by The Needless Lobsters
Summary: Percy's grounded... again. And this time, it's for yelling at his mother. But he's really got a party to go to, with a cute girl that he really wants to meet, so... maybe a couple of friends to help him out? Not that it was his idea to head to the party in the first place...


**Hey, guys! I had another fic in mind, so I ended up writing it... I hope you enjoy it!**

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><p>"I'm grounded."<p>

Fifteen year old Percy Jackson nearly sighed as he held the phone to his ear, laying on his bed and looking incredibly bored. It was the only thing that he'd managed to salvage out of the deal with his mother, although the contract on it had been temporarily cancelled so that he couldn't access the internet or speak to anyone without running out of credit quickly. Very irritating.

Furthermore, the one day that Percy happened to get grounded was the day that everyone needed him to _not_ be grounded.

"…_What the hell did you do this time, you idiot?_" a voice – one that clearly belonged to Jason Grace – asked, sounding rather irritated. Of course, he would be; Percy Jackson was his cousin and one of his closest buddies, and the two were meant to be hanging out at a party later. Obviously, if Percy was grounded, he couldn't go.

"I opened my fat mouth," Percy grumbled, huffing a little before deciding to elaborate. "Apparently, mothers don't like sass-talk."

"_And… you're only just realising that now…?_" Jason asked slowly, a tone of disbelief to his voice. Honestly, he couldn't believe how stupid his cousin was sometimes. How were they even related?!

"Well, how was I supposed to know?" Percy asked with a frown. "I'm usually the obedient little boy that always does what his mom says, unlike you!"

Jason scoffed. "_Yeah, yeah. Sure you are._" There was a moment of silence on Jason's end of the line, before he spoke again. "_So… you can't make it for the party tonight, then?_"

Percy sighed. "Not if I want to live…" he grumbled sourly.

"_Well that totally sucks._"

"I know, right?"

"PERCY! ARE YOU ON THE PHONE?!"

Percy winced when he heard his mother's voice. _Crap_. "Hey, Jason, I've gotta go…"

"_Yeah, I heard her voice. You're totally screwed._"

"Thanks for the support, friend." The dark haired teen quickly ended the call, before stuffing the mobile device under his pillow and laying down on top of it, trying to look innocent when his mother came into the room.

Sally Jackson scowled momentarily at the teenage boy, who gave her a grin, before walking over to the bed and holding her hand out to him.

Percy blinked, before raising his hand to give her a high-five, only to stop when she spoke.

"The phone, Perseus."

Percy winced. Whenever his mother used his full name, that meant he was in _so much trouble_… "Oh, come on, mom…"

"Hand over the phone, Percy."

The teen groaned, before pulling the phone out and practically throwing it into her hand, laying down and turning to face away from her as he scowled.

Sally looked through his recent calls, sighing. "Percy, I told you that the phone calls were for emergencies only."

Percy just rolled his eyes at her, still not turning to face her and deciding not to give her an answer. He waited until he heard a sigh, the pad of footsteps, and then the click of his door shutting before deciding to turn back to face the door.

Stupid moms were stupid.

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><p>Percy managed to stay in his bedroom for pretty much the rest of the day, ignoring calls for dinner and pretty much keeping up his moody tantrum as much as he could. Which he considered pretty brave on his part. His mother didn't bother him, leaving him to do his own thing, and his dad was kind of doing his Navy duties in another country – whatever that was – so it wasn't as if he could complain.<p>

In fact, nothing spectacular really happened until around seven-thirty. He'd been just about to drift off into a light sleep, since he was so bored, when he heard something hit his window. The dark-haired boy frowned for a moment, his eyes opening. It was when he heard the sound again he sat up, looking towards his bedroom window. He waited again for a few moments, before he heard the clacking again.

This time, he got up and headed over to the window, reaching for the lever and twisting it before pushing it open. He frowned and poked his head out of the window, only to spot a familiar blonde haired male standing underneath his window, some small rocks in his hands. The blonde grinned up at Percy.

"Hey, Perce!"

Percy stared at him incredulously. "What the heck are you doing here?!" he hissed, glancing around nervously. "People can hear you and see you out there!"

Jason just raised an eyebrow. "Clearly your mom can't if she's not nagging me to go away yet."

Percy sighed, before leaning on the windowsill and raising an eyebrow. "What are you still doing here?" he asked.

Jason dropped the rocks and grinned. "Well, I'm here to take you to the party, of course."

"I can't go."

"Why?"

"I'm grounded. I'm pretty sure I told you this before."

"That shouldn't stop you."

Percy blinked, before raising an eyebrow at Jason. "…So you're telling me to go against my mom's instructions and sneak out to a party whilst I'm grounded?"

"Yeah, pretty much."

"And why would I do that?"

"Because that wise-ass girl you think is cute will be there."

That made Percy perk up, and he stood up a little straighter. "Really?" he asked, sounding almost eager now.

Jason nodded, grinning and knowing that he'd probably won the guy over by now. "So, are you coming or not?"

Percy paused for a moment, before ducking back into his room.

Jason frowned as he watched Percy's window, waiting for him to come to a decision. He waited for about five minutes, before deciding that Percy had probably chosen against going to the party, and was about to turn to walk away when the window opened much wider. One leg suddenly emerged from the window, and then the other followed, and soon enough Percy was shimmying his way out of his bedroom window, hanging off the ledge before dropping down to the ground.

Jason grinned a little at that, folding his arms. Yup, the mention of that Chase girl _definitely_ won him over. It had been too easy.

When Percy had landed, he stood and turned to face Jason. "So, are we going or not?"

"What the hell are you doing here?"

The dark-haired male looked over at Percy from where he sat in the front passenger seat of the car, before he grinned cheekily, sending the green-eyed boy a wink. "I came to party, of course."

Percy frowned. "But I thought you'd moved school, Leo…"

"Doesn't mean I can't party in my home town, does it?"

Jason rolled his eyes at Leo, before reaching forward and punching him in the shoulder. "Of course you can! You're always welcome back here, Leo! Especially to our place!" he explained, ignoring how the other make rubbed his shoulder and whined.

"Don't encourage him, Jason," Thalia warned from the drivers' seat, scowling a little. "We can't have the little imp over every holiday. One dumbass is enough."

Leo scowled. "Hey!"

It took Percy a little while, but then he realized what Thalia meant. "Hey!"

The others just frowned. "It took you _that_ long, huh?" Jason teased.

Percy huffed and folded his arms, sitting back in the seat and scowling.

There was silence in the car as Thalia continued to drive them to the party, turning right down a street before making an almost immediate left. No one spoke until the loud base beat that could only be coming from a set of loudspeakers was heard, and Leo grinned back at the other two, his regular impish grin on his face.

"So… who's ready to party?!"

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><p>Percy grinned as he watched and cheered along with everyone, joining the crowd on the dance floor. A huge circle had formed, allowing everyone to see who was dancing in the centre.<p>

And the just happened to be Jason and that cute girl, Piper, who he'd had a crush on for ages.

There wasn't any alcohol at the party, but it was easy enough to get a load of teenagers excited at a party, especially when the majority of them happened to have ADHD.

The dark-haired teen was so busy watching his cousin and the cute girl that he didn't realise there was someone creeping up behind him until he felt a pair of lips on his cheek.

Okay… Percy wasn't completely sure that someone hadn't brought alcohol to the party.

He turned his head to see a familiar pair of stormy grey eyes staring at him, and he recognised them immediately. Of course he would recognise them. He could be not? He dreamed of looking into them every day.

"Annabeth…?" he asked, trying to make himself heard over the music.

She smiled and nodded, saying something. Her voice was drowned out by the music, and Percy frowned.

"I can't hear you!" he yelled, and she frowned before grabbing his hand and beginning to tug him out of the house, towards the porch. Not many people were out these, since the majority of the teens were either inside dancing or out in the garden. He followed her as she walked over to the porch steps and sat down, joining her.

"So…" he started awkwardly, before she spoke.

"You actually came?" she asked, smiling slightly.

He just raised an eyebrow at her. "I should be asking you that," he pointed out with a grin. "I thought you didn't go to parties?"

The blonde blushed. "I managed to get out to this one, alright?" She sighed. "My parents… they think I'm studying with Piper… and I should be."

Percy frowned. "You 'should be'?"

"Piper dragged me here against my will. I had no choice." She smiled at him. "You're probably the only person I can tolerate right now, because everyone else is on a sugar high."

The green-eyed male laughed. She was right – the sugar wasn't really helping anyone inside. He looked up at the sky. He couldn't really see much – it was just dark. But he knew that, if he was further from the city, he'd see thousands of stars. That's what he'd seen when out camping with his dad, anyway.

"So why are we out here?" he asked suddenly, turning to the female with a quizzical look on his face.

She shrugged. "I needed to get away from all that noise."

"Oh." He stayed silent for a few moments, before speaking again.

"Your eyes are pretty." He swore it was just his ADHD talking. Maybe the filter between his brain and his mouth had finally stopped working. And, from the look on Annabeth's face, she clearly hadn't been expecting him to say anything like that at all. In fact, she had a cute pink blush on her cheeks as she looked down at her lap, trying to shy away from Percy.

"Th-thank you…" she mumbled quietly.

Percy awkwardly scratched the back of his neck, trying not to laugh nervously at what he'd just done. "Uh…"

Then Annabeth did something he didn't expect – she kissed him on the cheek.

His eyes widened, and his cheeks flushed red as his jaw dropped a little. He _definitely_ hadn't been expecting that. At _all_.

Annabeth pulled away quickly, her cheeks flushing just as darkly, and she seemed to hesitate before speaking again. "U-um… I didn't… haha…"

Percy smiled slightly at her nervousness, and this seemed to snap her out of it, shown by the fact that her blush died down and she cleared her throat before standing.

"I, uh… I think we should head inside…" she explained, sounding as if absolutely nothing had just happened between them. "You know… before we get sick or something from being outside for so long."

Percy wasn't a genius, but he knew that there was no way the two of them were going to get sick out there. Still, he followed her cue, and headed inside, back to the living room. He sat on one of the couches in the corner, away from all of the dancing and partying that was still going on.

"Where were you?"

Percy's head snapped over to see the familiar little Latino boy smirking at him, casually chilling on the couch. He blushed faintly and looked away. "That's none of your business."

Leo's grin just widened. "But you came in with _Annabeth_," he pointed out. It was a known fact among the boys that Percy had had a crush on Annabeth since the fifth grade, which had turned out to be a good piece of blackmail material when they needed him to do something for them.

Percy narrowed his eyes at Leo. "So?"

"You must've done something with her." He leaned in closer to Percy. "And since you're blushing, it must've been something good…"

"Are you on a sugar rush or something?"

"Actually, no. I'm one of the few people in here that doesn't need sugar to go on a rush. I just like being annoying."

Percy huffed and turned away, scowling.

Leo's grin widened further – if that was even possible – when Percy turned away, and he moved to sit on the other side of the guy. "So… what did you do? Did you kiss, did you kiss?"

Percy rolled his eyes, tempted to turn away, but by the excited grin Leo was giving him he had a feeling that the guy wouldn't leave him alone otherwise. "She kissed me."

"That's awesome!"

"On the cheek."

"That sucks."

Percy scowled. "What?"

"Come on, a kiss on the cheek isn't much…"

"You just love to put a downer on my good mood, don't you?"

"I wouldn't be Leo if I didn't!"

"_Hey!_"

Both males looked up to see a pair of electric blue eyes staring down at them, and they expected them to belong to a male – but instead they belonged to a female.

"We're going – now!" she hissed at the two. "Our mom's on her way home!"

Percy paled and jumped up, following his cousin out of the house with Leo hot on his heels. He just hoped to whatever deity was out there that he wouldn't get into trouble… _again_…

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><p>"She kissed you?"<p>

"I thought we were done with this topic?"

"Well I didn't know about it."

Percy sighed and turned away, watching the buildings outside as they sped past.

"Can you guys shut up?" Thalia snapped from the driver's seat, trying to speed through the streets as safely as possible. "I need to concentrate here!"

"What's there to concentrate _on_?" Jason asked with a sigh, and Leo and Percy shrunk down in their seats, preparing for the outburst that was sure to follow.

"Well, I don't know, I have to drop Percy off, and then drop Leo off, and then _get home in time_…"

"Okay, okay, I get it! Sorry…"

There was no speaking until they reached Percy's home, where Thalia tried to screech to a stop as quietly as she could so as to not alert anyone of her arrival. As soon as the car stopped, Percy bid his goodbyes, promising to talk to the others later, before leaping out of the car and sprinting over to the area just beneath his window. From what he could see, all of the windows were closed and all of the lights were off, so everyone must've been asleep. At least, he hoped that.

He began to climb, making his way up to his window as he heard the car drive off. Just as he reached the window, he realised that his bedroom light was on, and he paused. He didn't remember leaving that on when he left…

He climbed up and into his room, and then he realised why his light was on.

"Hello, Percy."

He paused in his position on the window ledge, wincing. He should've _guessed_ that his mother would be in there. Why wouldn't she?

All that hoping from earlier had been for naught.

She just gave him a stern look as he slowly climbed into the room, and then stood by the window, his hands behind his back as he stared down at his feet.

"Hey, mom…" he greeted quietly.

Sally just gave him a stern look. "You were out with Jason."

Percy bit his lip. "Uh… yeah."

"At a party?"

"Um…"

"His mother told me, don't worry."

Percy cringed. Oh, he was so screwed… "Yeah… about that…"

"Perseus, you knew you were grounded," she pointed out, frowning at him. "You knew that, and yet you still went out to that party."

Percy just looked away, trying to scowl but still feeling guilty. Everything his mother was going to say would just make him feel worse.

"You knew, and yet you went. You've completely broken my trust."

He just kept looking down.

"I cannot believe you, Perseus." She stood and turned to walk away.

Percy frowned slightly as he watched her walk off. Was she really going to leave, just like that…?

Then, she paused at the door. "You're grounded until your birthday… next year."

"_What_?! Oh come on!"

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><p><strong>So... how was it?<strong>


End file.
